FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1075, 12 September 1930, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By “THE LOOK-OUT MAN."

GETTING THINGS READY

In view of the Polish Dictator’s nervousness about the result of the impending elections, 120 places have been prepared for the opposition at ! the Brest Litovsk gaol. "When the Polish opposition Gets too hot a proposition, The ruler or dictator gives a nod, And from junior whip to leader, Every irritating- pleader Is rapidly deposited in auotl. Suppose there were a riot. Or disturbance, in the Diet, The tumult would be quieted by stating That for Ilio.se who like disorder There’s a dungeon and a warder. And bed of straw, pins crust of bread a-waiting. Arid while in rage and anguish, The frustrated pundits languish. The president serenely sits and floats. Hut this means of laying dust is Hardly our idea of justice To the opposition—is it, Mr. Coates? AUCKLAND AHEAD Mr. J. Tyler, Auckland City Engineer, has returned from Wellington satisfied that In Wellington they have engineering problems that no other city has to encounter. Owing to the mountainous nature of some of the country, says Mr. Tyler, Wellington’s city engineers think nothing of grades of one in six, whereas in Auckland nothing above one in IS is aimed at. Nevertheless, the Wellington city engineers have not yet attempted anything as steep as Mr. Tyler’s anti-col-our legislation. So we still lead, THE FOREGONE COXCLVfHOX These modest Americans have held the America’s Cup for so long that they don’t seem to have any qualms about the result of the series beginning tomorrow. The races can. only end one way. Enterprise will romp down Long Island sound so far ahead of Shamrock V. that the Shamrock won’t hear the gun go off. This, at any rate, would be the impression gathered from a picture title flashed on to the screen during a showing of a gazette at a City theatre. “Picking a yacht to defeat Shamrock V., Sir Thomas Lipton’s challenger for the America’s Cup,” read the title. Yes, it is all over bar the shouting. But we entertain secret hopes that this time it may,be Sir Thomas Lipton’s turn to shout —and if he does so, it won’t be in tea. AMONG THE UIAXTS The disclosure that the “giants” who parade at side-shows and circuses are not giants at all, but acromegalics, or victims in perhaps a mild form of the disease from which a London doctor has just died, rather increases our respect for those oddlyproportioned people. After all. it sounds rather better to be acromegalic than to be overgrown. It would possibly be hard to define the line at which acromegaly becomes a disease instead of merely a stimulus to the growth. Possibly the giants who live in the pages of fairybooks were just acromegalics of a day when they didn’t know their “Materia Medica” very thoroughly. Perhaps the bigboned wrestlers and boxers who perform great deeds on canvas and mat are similarly afflicted. Perhaps, in short, we should cultivate a race of acromegalic forwards in readiness for the next Springbok visit. TRAMCAR FICTION Homeward bound Aucklanders filling' in that blank half-hour on trams, trains and ferries have a diversified taste in literature. Close research would probably show that taste in the different districts varies. Remuera might prefer something really highbrow, while Dominion Road would content itself with light fiction. The fact is, though, that light fiction seems to be preferred everywhere. A recent survey showed that Mr. Edgar Wallace retains his place as favourite of straphangers and ferry passengers alike. He has caused more people to “over-carry” past their stops than any other author. Office girls and typistes are the closest, students of trsfcncar fiction. Romantic tales of passionate adventure make them oblivious to their surroundings, and they hear nothing of the football arguments and the turf debates conducted by less enlightened wayfarers. MILITARY STUDIES Now and again a tram traveller is seen to he studying something quite distinct from the usual run of tramcar literature. One young man studies economics assiduously. Another has spent the last six months in laborious concentration on one of those little red-covered manuals of military training. What this ambitious warrior is thinking now that the whole scheme of territorial training has been cancelled is not apparent to his fellow travellers. Probably his active brain is speculating upon the possibility of starting a volunteer corps in which his already advanced knowledge of the military sciences may be utilised. What with peering involuntarily over his shoulder, some of his regular fellow-passengers, too, are wellinformed upon martial subjects. That is one way in which to keep abreast of contemporary tastes in literature.